Beneath You
by thebigguy
Summary: A continuation of the episode that i wanted to finish diffrently than they originally did. i just wanted it to last a little longer.


I don't own Buffy the Vampire Slayer characters Joss Whedon and Mutant Enemy does.  
This takes place immediately after "Beneath You" starting right at the end. I just wanted a continuation of what happens and answer my own questions about the final five minutes of the ep. So read review and tell me what you think.

Buffy stood there in the church's isle in the dark, always in the dark, watching Spike rant with the most pitiful and sorrow filled voice she had ever heard from anyone ever before. "Now everyone's in here talking! Everything I did, everyone I…. And Him! And It… the other, the thing Beneath. Beneath you. Its here too. Everybody. They all just tell me go. Go… to hell." And then he looked at her with despair and love, shocking Buffy with the enormity of what he had done.

'How could he have done that?' She asked herself. All the clues dropped into place as to why he had seemed so insane under the school. What had driven him that way. The things he said popped into one big ball of disbelief and shock. His soul was back. The spark that he kept saying he got for her. All of it was done for her, because of the reason that she still refused to believe. He did it because he loved her. Still the disbelief that coursed through her made her ask the question out loud. "Why? Why would you do..?"

The slight hint of a smile almost blocked out by the shadows of the darkness, was still shown by the light of the moon as he interrupted her, voice still filled with despair, "Buffy, shame on you. Why must a man do what he must for her. To be hers. To be the kind of man that would never…" and the pain of what he did stopped him from finishing. The remorse and self hate cracking through his voice as he tried to tell her of what he did for her.

His redemption.

Somehow he found the strength to try to continue and said, "The kind of man…" as he turned away from her, his love, his greatest sin. The one he never wanted to hurt, but always did. And he felt that he couldn't finish his explanation while looking at her. He saw the cross on the dais. The physical manifestation of what he was saying there in front of him. This was what he had to bare. This was the first step to his redemption for her.

He took a step forward toward the cross, his cross to bear, and continued, "And she shall look on him with forgiveness, and everybody will forgive and love… And he will be loved. So everything is ok right?" He took the final step on the dais and looked at it, knowing that his path was pain. He would always feel pain no matter what happiness he found in his un-life, with her or without her. He would forever be with pain.

Buffy felt him now, the emotions she tried so hard to bury crashed over her like a tidal wave. They were unrelenting as they crushed every wall she had erected to keep them at bay. Tears streamed down her face as she watch the broken man in front of her, knowing that she had played a part in bringing him down to his knees. What he had done to her before he left was inexcusable, she knew it and he knew it as well. But this was so much more. Her refusal to admit to the love she had for him had driven him to do the unthinkable twice now. First to try and rape her to make her feel her own emotions towards him, and then to regain his soul and suffer the tragedy of guilt over not only his sins against her but his sins against everyone in his attempt to make amends to her.

He loved her, she knew that now. She loved him he knew that and now she did to, but that love could not be voiced. At least not yet. Too much had happened. Too many times had they struck out at each other. Ripping at each others hearts either in denile or in retaliation of their own or the others feelings. She watched him speechless as he asked for forgiveness from the world that hated him and despised him almost as much as he hated and despised himself. And he asked for her forgiveness with what he did next.

He leaned on the cross. His cross and as the skin was chard and burned away, the smoke rising from him. He embraced it like he did a lover. Like he embraced her. The pain of the burns caused a slight gasp as he asked, "Can we rest now? Buffy can we rest?"

Tears welled down her face harder than before. She had no answer for him. She was stunned into stillness as she watched him burn himself against the cross as he hugged it as he once hugged her, and she remembered the comfort and warmth that she had gotten from those hugs. She remembered how much she felt and how protected she was when she had been enveloped by his strong body.

The smoke from his charring flesh rose up and quickly began filling the room hitting her senses and her mind like a ton of bricks. Tears still rolling she was shocked into action 'SAVE HIM' assaulted her as she stepped forward. "Spike!" she screamed as she ran to the dais and grabbed his arm trying to pull him away from the cross. His embrace hardened as she pulled not letting her take him away from the momentary burning away of his sins.

Tears finally fell from his tightly shut eyes. He felt her pulling at him, heard her as she said, "Spike please, let go. Please." He relished in the feel of her small hands on his arms and back as she pulled and pulled again his embrace of the pain that was his life, his forgiveness, his redemption. He could smell the sickly sweet smoke that was his charred flesh, the pain from it sweeping through him fighting with the pure pleasure of feeling her skin on him again, her voice asking him to let go of the pain. He refused by tightening his hold on the burning cross. Never would he let go of the pain, he deserved it. His sins demanded it. He felt a new pain as Buffy got her arms wrapped around his chest as she embraced him from behind and she tugged at him. In this position he felt something he thought he never would. He felt her tears as she pleaded with him to let go and she pulled.

He was not letting go. Panic was coursing through her as she felt his hold once again tighten on the cross that was killing him. She had put her arms around his chest and wailed "Spike let go! Please let go! I'll never forgive you if you don't let go!" She put her head on his shoulder and let all her emotions fuse together as she pulled on him her tears now running down his back. "Spike if you really love me you'll let go," she whispered as she pulled with all her might when suddenly his death grip on the cross loosened and they flew back onto the floor.

A wail rose out of his charred chest and throat as she now refused to let go of him as she rolled them onto their sides. His skin came off under her arms where he was burned but she knew he was beyond the pain of the flesh right now and she was afraid he would run back to the cross if she let go. So they laid there crying and every once in a while he would let out a wail of unspeakable sorrow. And Buffy, finally able to admit to herself at least, that she loved him, held him close comforting him and cooing soothingly into his ear as they let out all the sorrow and despair that they could. After hours she felt him finally sleep. The scorched flesh already beginning to heal, she pulled him up knowing that luckily they were near his crypt. She dragged him to it and laid him down, Spike never once waking up. She dressed his burns and slid into bed next to him, fresh tears rolling down her face and held him till sleep claimed her too.


End file.
